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House Price Cycles, Wealth Inequality and Portfolio Reshuffling

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  • Clara Martínez Toledano

    (PSE - Paris School of Economics - UP1 - Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne - ENS-PSL - École normale supérieure - Paris - PSL - Université Paris Sciences et Lettres - EHESS - École des hautes études en sciences sociales - ENPC - École des Ponts ParisTech - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - INRAE - Institut National de Recherche pour l’Agriculture, l’Alimentation et l’Environnement, PJSE - Paris Jourdan Sciences Economiques - UP1 - Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne - ENS-PSL - École normale supérieure - Paris - PSL - Université Paris Sciences et Lettres - EHESS - École des hautes études en sciences sociales - ENPC - École des Ponts ParisTech - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - INRAE - Institut National de Recherche pour l’Agriculture, l’Alimentation et l’Environnement, WIL - World Inequality Lab)

Abstract

Business cycle dynamics can shape the wealth distribution through asset price changes, saving responses, or a combination of both. This paper studies the implications of housing booms and busts for wealth inequality, examining two episodes over the last four decades in Spain. I combine fiscal data with household surveys and national accounts to reconstruct the entire wealth distribution and develop a new asset-specific decomposition of wealth ac- cumulation to disentangle the main forces behind wealth inequality dynamics (e.g., capital gains, saving rates). I find that the top 10% wealth share drops during housing booms, but the decreasing pattern reverts during busts. Differences in capital gains across wealth groups appear to be the main drivers of the decline in wealth concentration during booms. In contrast, persistent differences in saving rates across wealth groups and portfolio reshuf- fling towards financial assets among top wealth holders are the main explanatory forces behind the reverting evolution during housing busts. I show that the heterogeneity in saving responses is largely driven by differences in portfolio adjustment frictions across wealth groups and that tax incentives can exacerbate this differential behavior. Using a novel personal income and wealth tax panel, I explore the role of tax incentives exploiting quasi-experimental variation created by a large capital income tax reform in a differences- in-differences setting. I find that capital income tax cuts, largely benefiting top wealth holders, explain on average 60% of the increase in the top 10% wealth share during the re- cent housing bust. These results provide novel empirical evidence to enrich macroeconomic theories of wealth inequality over the business cycle.

Suggested Citation

  • Clara Martínez Toledano, 2020. "House Price Cycles, Wealth Inequality and Portfolio Reshuffling," PSE Working Papers hal-02876979, HAL.
  • Handle: RePEc:hal:psewpa:hal-02876979
    Note: View the original document on HAL open archive server: https://pjse.hal.science/hal-02876979
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Stéphane Auray & Aurélien Eyquem & Bertrand Garbinti & Jonathan Goupille-Lebret, 2022. "Markups, Taxes, And Rising Inequality," Working Papers halshs-03832267, HAL.
    2. Graeber, Daniel & Hilbert, Viola & König, Johannes, 2023. "Inequality of Opportunity in Wealth: Levels, Trends, and Drivers," IZA Discussion Papers 16488, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    3. Zhandos Ybrayev & Yernur Orakbayev & Askar Utarbayev, 2024. "Yield Curves for Main Street: Housing and financial capital returns in a developing economy," Economics of Transition and Institutional Change, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 32(1), pages 165-182, January.
    4. Pedro Trivin, 2022. "The wealth-consumption channel: evidence from a panel of Spanish households," Review of Economics of the Household, Springer, vol. 20(4), pages 1377-1428, December.
    5. Michele Lenza & Jiri Slacalek, 2024. "How does monetary policy affect income and wealth inequality? Evidence from quantitative easing in the euro area," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 39(5), pages 746-765, August.
    6. Luis Buluz & Filip Novokmet & Moritz Schularick, 2022. "The Anatomy of the Global Saving Glut," SciencePo Working papers Main hal-03881419, HAL.
    7. Charlotte Bartels & Carsten Schröder, 2020. "Die Bedeutung von Mieteinkommen und Immobilien für die Ungleichheit in Deutschland," Wirtschaftsdienst, Springer;ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 100(10), pages 741-746, October.
    8. Mauricio De Rosa, 2022. "Accumulation, inheritance and wealth distribution: first estimates of the untold half," Documentos de Trabajo (working papers) 22-07, Instituto de Economía - IECON.
    9. Albers, Thilo N. H. & Bartels, Charlotte & Schularick, Moritz, 2022. "Wealth and Its Distribution in Germany, 1895–2018," SocArXiv y6zpq, Center for Open Science.
    10. Charlotte Bartels & Carsten Schroeder, 2020. "The role of rental income, real estate and rents for inequality in Germany," Working Papers 7, Forum New Economy.
    11. Marius A. K. Ring & Thor Olav Thoresen, 2022. "Wealth Taxation and Charitable Giving," CESifo Working Paper Series 9700, CESifo.
    12. Arun Advani & Hannah Tarrant, 2021. "Behavioural responses to a wealth tax," Fiscal Studies, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 42(3-4), pages 509-537, September.
    13. Ruben Tarne & Dirk Bezemer & Thomas Theobald, 2021. "The Effect of borrower-specific Loan-to-Value policies on household debt, wealth inequality and consumption volatility," IMK Working Paper 212-2021, IMK at the Hans Boeckler Foundation, Macroeconomic Policy Institute.
    14. David R. Agrawal & Dirk Foremny & Clara Martínez-Toledano, 2020. ""Paraísos fiscales", wealth taxation, and mobility," Working Papers 2020/15, Institut d'Economia de Barcelona (IEB).
    15. Enea Baselgia & Isabel Z. Martínez, 2020. "A Safe Harbor: Wealth-Income Ratios in Switzerland over the 20th Century and the Role of Housing Prices," KOF Working papers 20-487, KOF Swiss Economic Institute, ETH Zurich.
    16. Ben Moll, 2020. "The Research Agenda: Ben Moll on the Rich Interactions between Inequality and the Macroeconomy," EconomicDynamics Newsletter, Review of Economic Dynamics, vol. 21(2), November.
    17. Kuvshinov, Dmitry & Zimmermann, Kaspar, 2020. "The Expected Return on Risky Assets: International Long-run Evidence," CEPR Discussion Papers 15610, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    18. Zwick, Eric, 2023. "Comments on “Wealth inequality dynamics in Europe and the United States: Understanding the determinants” by Blanchet and Martínez-Toledano," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 133(C), pages 44-47.
    19. Korevaar, Matthijs, 2023. "Reaching for yield and the housing market: Evidence from 18th-century Amsterdam," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 148(3), pages 273-296.
    20. Waldenström, Daniel, 2021. "Wealth and History: An Update," Working Paper Series 1411, Research Institute of Industrial Economics.
    21. Marco Moreno & Simone Cima, 2024. "Monetary policy shocks and their effects across the wealth distribution: evidence from new European data," Trinity Economics Papers tep0524, Trinity College Dublin, Department of Economics.
    22. Daniel Waldenström, 2021. "Wealth and History: An Update," CESifo Working Paper Series 9366, CESifo.
    23. Stéphane Auray & Aurélien Eyquem & Bertrand Garbinti & Jonathan Goupille-Lebret, 2022. "Markups, Taxes, And Rising Inequality," Working Papers halshs-03832267, HAL.
    24. Enea Baselgia & Isabel Z. Martínez, 2022. "Wealth-Income Ratios in Free Market Capitalism: Switzerland, 1900-2020," CESifo Working Paper Series 9976, CESifo.

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    Keywords

    Wealth distribution; Wealth concentration; Spain; Inequality; Asset; Housing; Wealth tax;
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